Director of the Emerging Pathogens Institute

It is my pleasure to announce that Dr. J. Glenn Morris Jr., an internationally recognized public health scientist, has been appointed Director of the University of Florida’s Emerging Pathogens Institute.

A Professor and Chairman of the Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine at the University of Maryland’s School of Medicine and Interim Dean of the University of Maryland’s School of Public Health, Dr. Morris will lead a campuswide effort to anticipate, understand and control the emergence of new, disease-causing microorganisms.

Dr. Morris received his bachelor’s degree from Rice University in Houston and his medical degree and a master’s in public health and tropical medicine from Tulane University in New Orleans. He maintains an active, National Institutes of Health-funded research program working in the area of molecular genetics and molecular epidemiology.

He began his career at the Centers for Disease Control, where he focused on cholera and other water- and food-borne diseases. He has served on numerous National Academy of Sciences food safety committees and was part of a U.S. Department of Agriculture team that helped rewrite the nation’s food inspection regulations.

Dr. Morris’ recent research has included work with viruses known as bacteriophages that invade bacterial cells and cause bacteria to self-destruct. Bacteriophages are re-emerging as an alternative to antibiotics for treating infection because specific phages can be used to attack specific bacteria and bacteria are less likely to develop resistance to them.